[xtm-wg] Re: call for HELP with MARKETING XTM

[Andrius Kulikauskas <ms@ms.lt>]

I would be interested to participate in, or help with, the Marketing
Committee.

Unfortunately, I haven't been secure any funding, so I won't be able to
participate at the UK meeting.  Would gladly change my mind, though! :)

I have been able to start up an egroup, kmci@egroups.com , for
grassroots activity within and around the Knowledge Management
Consortium International, http://www.kcmi.org , and we're discussing how
we might expand that.  David Dodds is active developing a vision for a
Unified Knowledge Language, something which the KMCI has intended to
organize for some time.  The kmci@egroups.com is specifically organized
as a forum where initiatives - such as popularizing Topic Maps, or the
questions Bernard Vatant has been raising - can be pursued in the
context of the knowledge management community.  All are welcome to sign
up by sending a blank message to kmci-subscribe@egroups.com

I've also written about the role use cases might play, especially in
marketing, on August 29, 2000.  I include that below - if I had funding
I would be happy to lead an effort to collect use cases outside of our
group as a way of getting people interested in the extent to which their
problems and solutions relate to Topic Maps.  That would make the impact
of Topic Maps both broader and more focused at the same time, a sort of
bell curve of use cases.

I also send separately two visions that the Minciu Sodas laboratory is
pursuing, that may relate to Topic Maps, as part of our mission to
foster caring about thinking.

Yours,

Andrius Kulikauskas, Ph.D.
Director
Minciu Sodas Laboratory
http://www.ms.lt
ms@ms.lt
+1 (773) 586-6280

> Hi Bryan and everybody, especially of XTM_ISS and XTM_CMS,
>      Although we don't have a lot of use cases yet, I think there is
> definitely a lot of important contribution that we will be making.  I
> think we've hit a nerve, but everything is new, so it's hard to imagine
> the scope of what we can accomplish.
>      What will be our deliverables?  I think this means, what do we
> intend to do over the next four months?  Especially, what can the other
> subgroups look to us for?
>      One important thing to note is that use cases can serve a wide
> variety of purposes.  They can:
>      OURSELVES) Help us figure out what "topic maps" means to us, the
> active members of TopicMaps.Org, not just what is written in the ISO
> standard.
>      DIMENSIONS) Help us understand what are the underlying dimensions
> (for example, from automated to manual, from structural to semantic,
> from ... to ...) that "topic maps" can deal with in a sophisticated
> manner.
>      SPIRIT) Help us become aware of other projects that share the
> spirit of topic maps, in that they involve the same underlying
> dimensions, but are perhaps less sophisticated, or more sophisiticated. 
> In other words, think of topic maps as a way of thinking, broader than
> just a particular standard.
>      ILLUSTRATION) Give us at least one clearly understandable example,
> that is not contrived, but shows the real issues that the full blown
> topic maps address.  Such examples help illustrate the standard for the
> implementors.
>      PROMOTION) Give us a whole quiver full of examples attractive to
> different audiences that can help Cupid promote topic maps.
>      CORE) Give us a spectrum of sophistication, along the various
> underlying dimensions, so that we can argue which concepts are central,
> and which are peripheral to topic maps.  We can present this spectrum to
> our fellow subgroups should they need to decide whether a particular
> concept should be made more pronounced, less pronounced, more explicit,
> less explicit, removed or added to the XTM, which may not necessarily
> match the ISO standard, but should match what TopicMaps.Org members
> think of as a "topic map".
>      COMPARISON) Use that spectrum to show how topic maps compares with
> other solutions, such as RDF, along the same dimensions, and have the
> use cases be the basis for any harmonization.  I doubt that anybody else
> will have such a cool set of use cases, and that will be a tremendous
> asset for topic maps, especially because they will show how great topic
> maps are.
>      EXPECTATION) Make such a spectrum of use cases available to the
> public, so people can make sound decisions whether topic maps are the
> right solution for them.  In many cases the answer may be, you don't
> really need the power of topic maps now, but you are definitely headed
> in that direction.  The use case spectrum shows the directions people
> naturally head in.
>      EXPLANATION) On the basis of such a spectrum, have a simple
> modeling language that explains how structures like topic maps come to
> be, why somebody would want to do something that sophisticated.  This is
> a major goal of the Minciu Sodas laboratory, the reason why I am
> participating, that we can conceptually show a progression of
> sophistication between a very simple standard for tools for organizing
> thoughts, for individuals working with www.thebrain.com or
> http://thoughtstream.org or etc. and something as rich as topic maps. 
> Topic maps, like it or not, are a modeling language.  Certainly the
> implementor, and a reflective user, needs to think in terms of the topic
> maps way of thinking.  The value of such a spectrum is great for tool
> makers like TheBrain who have a technology that can work great with
> topic maps, but really is a front end to a wide range of solutions of
> varying degrees of sophistication.
> 
>      That's a long list, and maybe you can add.  I think an important
> question now, one that we should ask our fellow subgroups, is which of
> these are relevant for their work during the next three months.  Our
> deliverables should be the minimum of what they need, and then
> everything else we can pursue according to our resources.
> 
>      There are a lot of exciting benefits that can come about.  We're
> just making them explicit, they've been in the past, and will be in the
> future.  Steven Newcomb wrote on August 27:
> 
> >>>>The syntax was developed mainly by Michel Biezunski
> during his lonely and heroic years of presenting the idea of
> topic maps to potential users and listening carefully to
> their feedback -- feedback that was often extremely
> difficult to decipher, and that required him to develop a
> deep understanding of the mindsets and world views of the
> potential users of topic maps.  As a result, the interchange
> syntax of topic maps is attractive to an extraordinarily
> wide variety of users and potential users.  That
> attractiveness is really what has made the topic maps
> paradigm such an economically interesting phenomenon, and
> it's the real reason for the existence of the XTM
> Specification Authoring Group (AG).  
> 
> >>>>think of the development of the syntax as
> being very like the development of a user interface, as if
> users were actually going to type in their topic map
> documents by hand (which they're not going to do, I know,
> but many creators of topic maps will have a need to
> understand and be intimate with the nuts and bolts of the
> topic map resources that they're creating).  A user
> interface must be intuitive -- it must teach users about
> itself and about the functionality to which it provides
> access.  During the development of a user interface, it is
> almost inevitable that many user requirements will be newly
> discovered.  Should we regard these requirements as *a
> priori* less important than the already-known requirements
> that will drive the process of developing a conceptual
> model?  I think not!
> 
> A little out of context, but I take it as evidence that there really is
> a need for all three subgroups.
> 
> Steven Newcomb also wrote on August 28th:
> 
> >>>>>I personally believe that dialogue between the modeling group and the
> syntax group will bring a greater understanding of the basic ideas
> here.  I do not believe that either group's models will be the truth,
> or even that the combination of all models will be the truth.  The
> truth is much more elusive and intangible than that.  But the truth
> *does* exist, it *does* await further unfolding, our apprehension of
> it *will* improve.  That improvement will be greater and sooner by the
> use of reasonable and reasonably diverse approaches to expressing it,
> especially in cases where multiple diverse expressions are *required*.
> 
> I think this is also true of the use case group. I think we pursue truth
> by asking three questions:
> 
> Modeling group:  We reflect a lot, but do we take a stand?
> Syntax group:  We take a stand, but are we implementing it?
> Use case group:  We implement, but do we reflect on that?
> 
> So all three need to be in parallel, and to learn together.  It is great
> that we have subgroups explicitly advocating for all three questions. 
> Having these three groups will make a difference as to the success of
> topic maps.  The use case group is new, so it would be great if we knew
> the minimum of what we should achieve.  Then we can do a lot extra, as
> we learn what is most useful for us to do.
> 
> So what should are deliverables be, what would be most helpful?
> 
> Andrius Kulikauskas
> Minciu Sodas
> http://www.ms.lt/importexport.html
> ms@ms.lt

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